Hasta La Motion!

I’m trying to figure out what the viewer indicator for "Value" is really telling me. That thing at the bottom of the viewer. It’s showing me the R, G and B values, as well as H,S,V and L. Lightness gives me the average of RGB, as it should. An RGB value of 0.5 however, returns V=0.74, while a RGB=0.21404 returns me a V=0.5.

Putting down a new Constant node with the V set to 0.5, still gives me a V=0.74 in the viewer.

From what I understand, Value is simply max(r,g,b) which in a gray-scale image would make no difference.

I’m guessing there’s some gamma:ing going on somewhere. What am I missing?

edit: oh, and I’m talking about 16-bit images, if that matters.